The Power of the Dog is Netflix's latest attempt to grab some Oscars as far as I can tell. Starring Benedict Cumberbatch (Phil), Kirsten Dunst (Rose), and Jesse Plemons (George), this two hour 1920's period piece movie about the life of a rancher who's time is passing him by and the ways he handles change, is long, meaningless, and a waste of everyone's time.
The film starts off strong as we see Phil and his brother George on their daily ranching duties. George is being a bit aloof on this particular day, his head in the clouds. Phil seems particularly annoyed by this as he can tell George has been growing more and more distant from Phil and their ranching ways. George has become more of a city type person, and has taken a fancy to Rose, a local widowed innkeeper. Phil takes to this like a cat getting a bath, seeing his brother leave him behind and moving on with his life while Phil desperately clings to the past.
Phil is aggressive straight away, and ad-nauseam the audience is pelted with constant scenes of Phil bullying everyone around him as the film slowly (and I mean slowly) unravels Phil's past. The vast majority of Phil's behavior stems from having lost a close friend and mentor, whom he was also in a gay relationship with. This was uncovered by Rose's teen son (Peter), whom Phil has also been bullying as Peter is more accustom to city life, he is very socially awkward, and has more interest in his medical studies than people. This is rife of material for Phil to ridicule.
George, meanwhile, sets up a party with his parents and the governor and his wife. George, now married to Rose, asks her politely if she can play a few songs on he piano for the evening. Rose agrees, though reluctantly, putting pressure on herself. She could have said no, George is portrayed as a sweet guy throughout the film and would have understood. But societal pressures break Rose and she gives in. Unable to play at the party, she embarrasses herself and this, coupled with Phil relentlessly whistling the tune she was supposed to play on the piano leads her to abusing alcohol.
I bring all this up to highlight the major points of Phil's bullying. He is extremely passive aggressive. That's all he does. He whistles at Rose and she goes into a drinking stupor. This is Phil's major crime, as the movie outlines. Because of this, ultimately Peter ends up killing Phil after getting close to him using the knowledge of Phil's sexual preferences as leverage. If you thought I just wrote that abruptly, wait until you see how abruptly the movie handles it.
The movie does a terrible job of giving any of these characters an ounce of believability, rationale, motivation, or character arc. Phil starts off with a good arc of a rancher clinging to the past. That's as far as this movie gets though. Phil dies before he can change, before he learns acceptance, before he can come to terms with change, before he can come to terms with his sexual orientation. He learns nothing. None of the other characters even build to an arc of any kind.
George takes a backseat to Rose's drinking problem and barely becomes aware of it until the end. Rose succumbs needlessly to societal pressures that George didn't even put on her, she simply married into it. She put all that pressure on herself, and allowed Phil's random acts of whistling to drive her to the sauce. Peter remains socially awkward and it's heavily hinted that he is a psychopath who has no issues with death and murder.
None of these characters have any growth or arc to speak of. The story ultimately becomes about removing a toxic person from your life, even by way of murder is ok, and your life will be better for it. I cannot for the life of me understand how this is getting a 96% from critics. It's as if all critics have forgotten basic story-telling. Maybe they are all just happy to see a movie without Marvel super heroes in it.
